I have come into possession of a piece of work that my Uncle Mick did during the 1960s. He was in his thirties when he wrote the ‘Boats of Vallisneria’ having survived a childhood of war and evacuation, having completed what education was available then, having completed a period of military service in Kenya and South Africa and returned to London, to move to Billericay in Essex, to begin his life proper. His father (my grandfather) died early in the 60s and he spent the rest of his life living with and looking after his mother living in the tied cottage to the farm he worked.

He completed this work because he wanted to explore the shape and pattern of [his] life. He completed it even while the changes in farming brought his work there to a close. [He went on to become a gardener and eventually set up his own business framing pictures]. He submitted the manuscript to Dent & Sons for publication, but they declined.

He let me have a look at the script when I was in my late teens and visiting and whinnying on about wanting to be a writer. This was in the later 1970s. I was way too green and cursive to read it with great discernment or generosity and commented that it was OK but quite amateurish (a youthful candour with which I hurt many a person close to me when I was young and arrogant – I’m sorry, everyone).

The dear man died in 2007, and I had long since forgotten his work (although I remember being honoured that he had shown me his work – it confirmed to me that being a writer was a noble thing to be). I had a visit recently from my brother who brought a whole case of artefacts from my uncle, one of which was the original manuscript.

… I think I’d like to publish it on my blog. Share the work with the world that he was not so able to do during his own time. In his honour. In memoriam. To preserve and celebrate the green-paint-on-sturdy-wood life of Ramsden Heath during the 1960s and 1970s. To celebrate the linen-atmosphere of small-pane cottage window looking out on the garden in all facet. To listen in on the darken-colours of morning and evening and bird-call in Essex countryside, every one different and newly-miraculous found.

While typing it up I felt I could tap the kernel of what he was exploring and cut in to his images and experiences within – and sometimes behind – his writing. I would also like to explore his writing through my own. And publish them alongside each other like a healthy pair of framed pictures above the mantelpiece. To celebrate my love for him. And make the contact with him that I was too gauche to make while he was alive. (How much I appreciate people the most, once I have lost life with them).

to put down
my compass plans
for every detail
but only just now
doing it

looking for what to publish today, I found my uncle unassumingly proffering the lesson in life that he always gave, even nine years after he died: that you don’t look for life, you notice it; some teachers teach by being rather than saying, so that you don’t realise you are being taught until you know; wherever he is now, I hope he knows what he gave me/us … in fact I dedicate the clean-ity of all I notice to return the gift to my uncle wherever his lives have led him now

a salute to my Uncle Mick (1935 – 2007) who lived with great gust through the trees and great dark-wood texture for most of his life in Ramsden Heath, Essex, quietly, with a smile

Dear Dad

it was good to see you on such a sad day
Mick would have been satisfied that we had come together as family again
whether he was there or not

I wandered in his house a little to say goodbye
and to see if there was anything I wanted to take
to remember him I didn’t take anything
I might have taken endless bits
awkwardly
or I had to realise that all my time with him
had happened thirty years ago already passed that I cannot hold onto
I have to say goodbye to him
with gratitude
to recognise what he gave to my life
and to the world
a more complete tribute
than trying to hold onto all the bits and pieces

all those people who attended the ceremony
all pulled together by eye and staple
the perfect meet of frame and circumstance*

Mick taught me to see
the colour of oil in a lamp
the deep colour of port through a green bottle
the deepest green of holly and laurel
the shadows under border shrubs

I learnt to smell hedgerows
while walking too fast past them
I listened to the ancientness
of horse and leather and dogs
I creaked the chairs and drew the wood and linen of pubs closed
to the rain-slatter of the afternoon

I envied his example – the lesson – the nobility of action
translucent gallantry and service to anyone who was around –
it was not too much to go out into the kitchen and make everyone a round of sandwiches when every one couldn’t be bothered –
quiet and strong

I remember
Ringo** lifted up to head height so that he could see himself in the mirror
(he didn’t notice, but looked at the floor)
I remember the canary-yellow sports car parked in the field
away from Nan’s annoyance

and the draw of a cigar slightly moist yet
with light brown wrapping and deep brown leaf –
he was completely arrived when he held that cigar gently between jointed fingers –
and the crawling out of a bedroom window right along the roof of the outhouses
to get THE shot in a water fight during a too hot day
and the magic – the alchemy – showing me how to paint the image of a tree
with oils – a stroke and a dab-smudge in the wind
you ‘suggest’ the shape rather than create it –
the single detail he painted on the mantelpiece in his sitting room
olive green
the near-tearful goodbyes when the visit came to an end waving until we were out of sight –
he’s still waving!

he once showed me annoyance
when he stopped me walking straight across a side street in Herbert Road
without checking I was a little stunned
but enormously honoured that he thought it was important

I probably only saw him
for forty days in my life
but he has coloured my world as indelibly as oil paint
(suggested not created)
I saw great loss in your face and your shoulders today
Dad
but please please look at all the colour and texture
in your life from the 72 years you shared with him
he was an OK painter on canvas
but he created wonderful landscapes
in our lives

he once lamented
that you and I don’t see each other much – and he was damned right of course –
his last masterstroke was to show me this
today

* Mick served in Kenya during his National Service; when he returned he worked on a farm and as a gardener and finally set up his own business framing pictures which supported him for the rest of his life
** stupid boxer dog family pet

I am visiting Manjushri Institute* with my family
we come to a room and I realise I am joining
Geshe Kelsang** for dinner

I should not be here sharing dinner with Geshe-la
I cannot meet his look
but he is very host-like and gracious
he bears no resentment
it is just myself
giving myself
a hard time

—–~“O”~—–

dream310307

I am at a gathering
in someone’s house
some sort of teaching event happening
sitting in the lounge I notice
that the picture on the wall is different
it is a large sketch of Geshe Kelsang**
drawn from above ‘comic book’ realistic
later in the morning I join a group for breakfast
I am following a figure onto the balcony
in fact I am that figure
then I am seeing from that figure’s perspective
like a documentary
the figure is Geshe Kelsang and then
I am myself again
and Geshe-la is joining us for breakfast
honoured to have him join us
he is jovial and light-humoured
he takes one mouthful of something –
was it avocado – and quips ‘I am better now’
putting down his knife and fork

all my fathers of this life
I don’t get on with them that well
I seem to find myself in a position
I cannot talk with them
I expect an impossible ideal of them
I see them fall short and then
I sulk
…

—–~“O”~—–

dream151007

at the table
at the feast
Geshe-la**
sees me reach
for the food
chastises me
for wanting
to eat too
soon

* Conishead Priory, known as Manjushri Institute, in Cumbria on the shores of Morecambe Bay. A Buddhist college; lived there 1983-1984.
** Geshe-la – affectionate honorific used for the teacher, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso. I moved from the Priory to begin my career twenty years previous to these dreams.

in a house which is all my house
I was both a child and the parent that I am
I am in the large airy conservatory
where we all collect together

I notice my Nan working
mixing something into a bowl
with the help of mechanical hands
which move like real hands
folding unfolding grasping held at the wrists
she has to use these hands she is getting old

she is preparing for something for the family
she is tired she is pushing herself
she has an air of bitterness and upset
she says to me after a little while
“don’t open the presents too early
I know what you are for being in the moment”

I wander off chastised
I am making her worried
I might open the presents too early
I might do that

I arrange the presents around the tree
I wasn’t going to open them too soon
I wasn’t going to spoil it all for Mum but
I become so locked with accumulation
I am just moving back to immanence
to innate wisdom to intuition to creativity
I hope I am not dishonouring Mum
I merely wish to travel my path
I couldn’t spoil it all could I?

I
ruptured from my family
to find my greater self
I worked the land
and it broke my back
I took a child to call
the land my own I
could make this land
for the benefit of all I
could be for the benefit
of all a fit place
to raise a family

I
must break you all
to make you see
you must eat the land I
bring to you I will make
you feed with my own hand
to your mouth if I have to
and then you will be baptised
and then you will see
my worth do you see
do you see do you see

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… Mark; remember …

"... the impulse to keep to yourself what you have learned is not only shameful; it is destructive. Anything you do not give freely and abundantly becomes lost to you. You open your safe to find ashes.
~ Annie Dillard